White House Demands Iran Give Up Entire Nuclear Program, Including Civilian Enrichment

Authored by Jason Ditz via AntiWar.com,

While continuing to closely tie the recent US attacks on the Houthis in Yemen to Iran, National Security Adviser Mike Waltz confirmed that the Trump Administration is demanding „full dismantlement” of Iran’s nuclear program, including its capacity to enrich uranium for civilian use.

Waltz made the comments on CBS’ Face the Nation, and when asked what full dismantlement meant and to clarify the distinction between it and the verification deal the US had with Iran before President Trump pulled out of it in 2018, he made it clear this is far broader, covering everything, including enrichment, „weaponization,” and strategic missile programs.

Iran’s enrichment program, which is under IAEA monitoring, has no military component in the first place. Enrichment was purely for making fuel rods for the Bushehr nuclear power plant along Iran’s coast and for making somewhat higher enriched fuel for its medical isotope reactor. Iran has a long history of having a substantial nuclear medicine program, and supplied its own isotopes for that.

The long-abandoned nuclear deal was meant to give Iran a design to produce isotopes without 20% enriched uranium through a heavy-water reactor. Like most of the promises to Iran under the deal this was never honored, and Iran is left with the old research reactor. Higher levels of enrichment were also done to try to encourage new negotiations, though Iran promised the IAEA that they would not go above 60% levels, and weapons-grade uranium is a minimum of 90%.

National Security Adviser Mike Waltz meets with US soldiers in D.C.

Waltz’ new demand is not that Iran goes back down to 20% or anything, it’s to stop enrichment entirely. It’s unclear in the context if Iran is even allowed to keep it’s power plant, though without the ability to enrich uranium to make their own fuel, it would be effectively useless in fairly short order.

Beyond that, Waltz demanded Iran scrap its „weaponization” program, which will be a challenge because Iran does not have one, and US intelligence assessments have repeatedly said Iran hasn’t decided to try to make such a weapon though such assessments never seem to inform the content of US demands.

He also demanded Iran get rid of its entire strategic missile program, which since they haven’t even attempted to create nuclear warheads would exclusively impact conventional weapons in Iran’s arsenal. Though presented as something to do with nuclear dismantlement, it is effectively unrelated in the case of these missiles.

Waltz confirmed that the US had received multiple responses from Iran regarding the demands, which were initially submitted through a letter. He declined to discuss what the responses were in any way, but said there was an ongoing „back and forth” and that „all options are on the table.” He further vowed Iran would face consequences if they didn’t submit to the demands.

The latest US demands are by far the furthest they’ve gone in demands for nuclear concessions from Iran, but they once again appear founded in the same false narrative that the program has a military component, even though US intelligence has consistently confirmed it does not.

The refusal to disclose what Iran’s response to the demands has been so far is likely based in part on avoiding talking about how Iran doubtless reiterated that they don’t have such a program to give up. Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has publicly responded in part, by rejecting the idea of direct talks with President Trump on the matter.

Khamanei has previously expressed openness to direct talks with the US, but since Trump was the one who tore up the previous nuclear deal, he has said that there is no value in talking with a party they can’t count on to fulfill their commitments.

The US must know that when facing Iran, threats will never achieve anything.

— Khamenei.ir (@khamenei_ir) March 21, 2025

Russia issued a statement on Friday which appears to reject the basis of the US demands, saying Iran has every right to have a peaceful nuclear program for civilian purposes. Western European nations have previously given lip-service to past US demands to restrict Iran, but it is unclear if even they will go along with the idea that Iran isn’t allowed to enrich uranium to civilian levels. Beyond Israel, the Trump Administration might be alone given the severity of this latest demand.